1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile communication terminal having a projector, and more particularly to a structure of a mobile communication terminal having a projector which structure enables rapid dissipation of heat generated from the projector and other elements built into the terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, with convergence and combination of digital technologies, a projector function (an image-projection function) has been added to a mobile communication terminal. This will enable a user can enjoy contents, such as a moving picture, a still picture, an electronic book, and the like, which are intended for many users to share, in the state of being an enlarged (e.g., in the size from 10 to 40 inches) projected image.
However, such a mobile communication terminal having a projector function generates a great quantity of heat from its internal elements because it has multiple heat sources, such as a light-emitting element of a projector and other elements for implementing mobile communication.
A projector, which is mounted in the mobile communication terminal, basically has low electro-optical conversion efficiency so that it uses a luminous element, such as a light emitting diode (LED) or a laser diode (LD). A LED or LD is a source of high heat when used as a light source of an illuminating system. Further, the luminous element such as the LED or LD is more vulnerable to detrimental effects of heat than other electronic products because temperature changes can cause variation in output characteristics.
Thus, if heat that is generated when the mobile communication terminal having the projector is driven is not efficiently dissipated, the performance of the light source of the illuminating system degrades, and the lifetime of an internal element is shortened due to over-heating in the terminal. This is an important reason why thermal design is important.
Conventional heat-managing methods are effective only for preventing the heat source from excessively overheating, but are not intended to effectively dissipate heat. A generally known method is a compulsive dissipation method of blowing air to a radiating plate using a fan so as to implement heat exchange. The radiating plate has fins and an enlarged effective area. However, while the compulsive heat dissipation is effective for the case of the heat source, such as the projector generating high temperature, it is hardly adapted to the mobile communication terminal. This is because for compulsive heat dissipation, a mobile terminal would necessarily include the radiating plate with the fins and the fan with a motor. This would have the undesirable effect of altering the mobile terminal so that the size is enlarged, would require additional power to run the fan, and increase the occurrence of unwanted noise at the same time.
In addition, in the case of trying to use natural heat-radiation, the mobile communication terminal cannot effectively radiate heat because, due to its limited size, it has a limited potential radiation area.